y to face the evil in himself. The final showdown between Jeffrey and Frank takes place, appropriately, in Dorothy's flat in the Deep River apartment houseor in the deep, dark waters of Jeffrey's subconscious. Frank is not an enemy who is easy to beat. Just like the id would have access to the mind of the ego Frank also has inside knowledge of Jeffrey's movements through a police radio. He cannot be overpowered by sheer forceit is only intelligence that can defeat instincts. Jeffrey's trick of hiding the radio allows him to close his mind to Frank and gives him the advantage of a surprise attack. He sends a bullet into Frank's brain "to annihilate the monstrous dark side of his own self that has been contaminated by exposure" (Dirks, "Blue Velvet (1986)", http://www.filmsite.org/blue.html). At the end of his quest Jeffrey becomes the victorious hero who has defeated the evil forces both outside and within and thus deserves happiness and the love of the chosen girl. In a dream that Sandy described earlier she saw their world as dark and empty of love. Deliverance came in the form of thousands of robins bringing a "blinding light of love". As the fight is over we see Jeffrey and Sandy embrace each other, then their figures melt into a bright, white light. Ultimately, Jeffrey's deliverance comes from the love brought by Sandy. The underworld vanishes out of site as we are brought backthrough Jeffrey's earinto the light of sunny, bright, idyllic Lumberton. The darkness is gone and, as Sandy has prophesied, the robins arrive. One of them settles on the windowsill holding a big black bug in its beak. During the course of the film insects have come to symbolize evil under the surface. In the beginning they are seen hiding under the manicured lawn, later we discover them crawling on the severed ear. It is also quite suggestive that Jeffrey first enters Dorothy's apartment as an exterminator. Thus the robin eating the bug can obviously be interp...
